


flickering

by willowcabins



Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Drug Abuse, Drug Addiction, F/F, Narcotics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-11
Updated: 2013-06-11
Packaged: 2017-12-14 17:22:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/839424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/willowcabins/pseuds/willowcabins
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the precinct had copied down her statement and Art had finally let her get into her car, Elizabeth chose not to go home. Her safe place was somewhere completely different.</p>
            </blockquote>





	flickering

**Author's Note:**

> Fair warning: this snapshot serves as an impression of an extremely depressed and confused character's mind, thus there is very explicit drug usage and mild implications of suicide. Please don't read if this triggers you.

The quiet rumble of the engine faded as Beth’s car stopped in front of the large suburban house. Her hands were still shaking, she discovered, feeling eerily calm, as she took them off the steering wheel. Her breath was too fast: hitching in her throat and giving her a headache as she tried to find oxygen to fill her lungs with. Stopping; arriving had infused Beth with more anxiety. Suddenly it was too much.

She grabbed her chest and blindly reached for the purse on the set next to her, lack of oxygen speeding up her breathing even more until black spots appeared in the corner of her vision.

It was shortly after four in the afternoon; Beth shouldn’t be here. She coughed, gagging on her own sobs that seemed to be lodged in her throat.

The bottle fitted so neatly into her hand: a well-practiced motion allowed a handful of pills to tumble out. Beth blindly swallowed the lot, aware of the danger, and suddenly being so desperate for breath she didn’t care anymore. Her hands shook but she was still able to swallow, the pills forcing their way down her esophagus.

She pulled out her clone phone and pressed ‘2’ on the speed dial. It must have taken longer than she thought, because the pills in her stomach were taking effect. Beth leaned her head against the cold window as she desperately tried to hear the corresponding sound of Alison’s phone ringing in the house.

Her breathing was chemically slowed: her heart rate descended gently as a wave of calm pulsed through her, pushing Beth against the car seat. She was simultaneously weightless, hovering above her own body, and incredibly heavy, pushing against the window until she started to trace imaginary fault lines.

“Beth?” Alison’s voice was far away and soft and distorted by the cheap phone. And yet it somehow made Beth’s heart stutter in her chest.

 _Come save me_ , she wanted to say. “I’m here.” The words fell of her lips like molasses: thick and sugar coated. They seemed to leave a warm aftertaste in her mouth and Beth blinked slowly, realising suddenly that Alison was asking her a question.

“Here? Beth!” the phone line went dead. Beth looked at the phone, confused. She bit her lip and dropped the phone onto the seat next to her slowly. She watched as it bounced and settled in fascination. She looks at the window and Alison was there, pink vest and white jumper and glare all in place. Beth meant to smile, but she blinked and for a second, a split second, Alison flickereds, shivering in and out of existence.

Beth panicked, suddenly clawing at the door: she needed to get out, she needed to explain everything to Alison and have Alison touch her to be reminded this _was_ real and she was doing theright thing. Alison yanked open the door and Beth fell out, landing clumsily on the wet grass. Alison’s glare disappeared as she picked Beth up, propping her against the side of the car.

“Are you okay?” Alison’s voice was uncharacteristically soft. Beth didn’t even try to concentrate on words. With the amount of tranquilizers in her system, making sense was not going to happen. She cupped Alison’s face instead, tracing her cheek bone as she let the BMW behind her bear her weight.

“You are so beautiful,” Beth whispered. Alison shifted, stepping out of Beth’s touch and looking around carefully before she sighed dramatically.

“You can’t drive like this,” she muttered unhappily and grabbing one of Beth’s hands. With one last furtive glance, Alison dragged her into the house. She put Beth on a couch and then called up to her children, her voice harsh and commanding and yet so _instinctively_ motherly it made Beth shudder. The sofa was cold against her back; somehow this shape wasn’t designed for her.

Beth lay down on the carpeted floor instead and looked up at the ceiling, concentrating on her breaths.

She held her hands up to the ceiling and thought about the awkward puzzle piece that wouldn’t fit. It was so strange that Alison, who was so like her, and yet not _her_ at all, _did_ fit. Beth dropped her hand onto her chest and considered the ceiling with renewed vigour. Nothing around Beth felt real anymore; everything was flickering and shivering in reality and it made it hard for her to breathe. Paul and his eyes; his wrong eyes that made Beth shudder and hang in the balance and lose it all in one moment.

Suddenly Alison was there and Beth’s head was cradled in her lap. Beth looked up at her and swallowed.

“How are you so different?” Beth whispered and Alison cracked a sad smile, carefully stroking Beth’s hair.

“You’re smarter than me?” Alison offered with a shrug. Beth rolled her eyes.

“Are we all the same?” She asked after some moments of silence during which Alison just rhythmically stroked her hair and Beth felt herself dissolve into the warm carpet; into Alison’s perfect warm lap; into Alison’s simple life.

“No.” Alison shook her head, but left it without explanation. Beth twisted inwards and took Alison’s still hand from the floor, holding it over her face to inspect it.

“What makes us different?” Beth dropped Alison’s hand and Alison began rubbing small circles on Beth’s stomach. “We have the same DNA; we have the fingerprints. When they cut us up, will they find our hearts in the same place?”

“I’ll ask them,” Alison murmured with a chuckle. Beth grabbed her hand suddenly, the terrifying image of Paul standing over her dead body and sighing as he inspected her organs.

“Don’t ever let them have my body, Alison. Don’t.” Her voice was forceful and it shook her out her own trance. She sat up and stared Alison in the face. “Don’t let them ever sit above me and say ‘she was them’.” Beth didn’t realise she was crying until Alison cupped her cheek and brushed away the tear with a sad smile.

“You’re you,” she promised. Beth swallowed, trying to stem the flow of tears and absorb Alison’s words. Not just the words: the little quirks with which she emphasised them. Quirks that were so noticeably not her own. “You’re so very different. You’re the strong one, the one that will save us.” They were so close and Beth could smell Alison: the sharp smell of cooking and cheap perfume. She leaned forward and lightly brushed her lips over Alison’s. It was a sudden, rash action and Beth pulled back almost immediately, settling herself back down on Alison’s lap. She waited for the combing to begin again, missing the rhythm of Alison’s hand in her hair. Alison was stiff, but as Beth waited she regained her confident demeanour and carefully continued combing Beth’s hair.

Words like that are hard to forget.

Beth drove home and traced the scar on her neck.

What would they say as they dissected her body? Her heart was in the right place, but her mind wouldn’t let her? Or will they just look at her body and realises she was the broken one; the faulty one?

Beth swallowed another pill.


End file.
